Waffen-SS Galician Division still Revered by Canada’s Ukrainian Right

This Captive Canada article looks at a Nazi Waffen-SS division of Ukrainians who volunteered to form a 13,000-strong unit under Reichsführer Himmler in 1943. Despite opposition from Jews and Ukrainian leftists, thousands of these vets were welcomed to Canada after WWII -- thanks to our Liberal govt. Vets from both the Nazi-linked OUN/UPA and the Waffen-SS formed groups here that joined the Ukrainian Canadian Congress (UCC), which our govt created in 1940 to fight socialists & communists on the homefront. These Nazi vets groups are still listed as members of the UCC. (Read details here.) This history helps us understand current events in Ukraine and Cda's role there.

This article was written for and first appeared inCaptive Canada: Renditions of the Peaceable Kingdom at War, from Narratives of WWI and the Red Scare to the Mass Internment of Civilians

After its creation by Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler, recruitment for the Galician SS began in May 1943. While over 70,000 Ukrainians volunteered, but only 13,000 made the cut.

Ukrainian Catholic and Orthodox churches helped rally this SS Division and then supplied it with military chaplains. Religious, ethnic and political symbols were congealed to inspire hatred of Jews and Communists. For example, a 1944 Easter greeting from the Galician SS—depicting a smiling couple in traditional dress—said: “Christ has arisen! Only with the faithful brotherhood of the Waffen-SS can we save Ukraine from judeocommunist dominance!”1 And, as Volodymyr Kubijovy, the Ukrainian-Polish politician who helped create the Galician SS, proclaimed in 1943: “The Fuehrer of the Great German Reich has agreed to the formation of a separate Ukrainian volunteer military unit under the name SS Riflemen’s Division ‘Halychyna’ [Galician].... You must stand shoulder to shoulder with the unbeatable German army and destroy, once and for all, the Jewish-Bolshevist monster.”2

Not only did it join the Nazi war against the Soviet Army, the Galician SS also murdered Jews, Communist partisans and villagers trying to protect them. Created, financed, trained and armed by the Nazis, the Galician SS was integral to the German military. Commanded by fanatical Brigadeführer Fritz Freitag, all Galician SS troops took this vow to Hitler: “I swear before God this holy oath, that in the battle against Bolshevism, I will give absolute obedience to the commander in chief of the German Armed Forces Adolf Hitler, and as a brave soldier, I will always be prepared to lay down my life.”3Recruits swore this “holy oath” after a religious service led by military chaplain Vasyl’ Laba. After coming to Canada, Laba was the Ukrainian Catholic “vicar at the Edmonton eparchy from 1950 and became honorary member of the Ukrainian War Veterans Association in Edmonton.”4

In Murderous Elite, on Waffen-SS history, James Pontolillo details a litany of “extermination operations” in which Galician SS units “murdered thousands of innocent civilians.” For example, in the summer of 1943, Division members joined “anti-partisan operations in Poland which resulted in the wholesale murder of innocent civilians.” Later that year, “divisional elements assisted in the deportation of Polish Jews to KL [concentration camp] Auschwitz for extermination.”5

While fighting in German-occupied Poland in January 1944, the Galician-SS engaged “in mass executions of Ukrainians, Jews, and Poles...under a pretext of anti-partisan actions,”6 says University of Ottawa political scientist Ivan Katchanovski. In February 1944, the Galician Division’s 4th SS police regiment helped kill 500 to 1,500 civilians in Huta Pieniacka, Poland, where 120 houses were incinerated. While children were killed in front of their parents, hundreds were herded into barns and burned alive. In March, this same regiment helped kill hundreds of villagers hiding in a monastery in Podkamien, Poland. These crimes were part of the “pacification” of eastern Galicia. Poles were targeted for hiding Jews or for aiding the local communists who were fighting the Nazis.7 These SS operations “destroyed 20 villages,” killed more than “5,000 innocent people, and shipped... 20,000 civilians off to Germany as slave laborers.”8

After being largely routed by the Soviets in July 1944, the Galician SS was replenished and redeployed to Slovakia. There it joined other SS units in suppressing the Slovak National Uprising which was fighting the Nazi’s clerico-fascist puppet regime. The Galician SS helped kill Slovak civilians, and burned villages that were helping partisans and hiding Jews.9

Although the Galician SS was declared a criminal organisation at the Nuremberg war crime trials, Canada’s Ukrainian Right has always memorialised these WWII vets as anticommunist heroes. They have done this in a myriad of ways from speeches, media releases and ceremonies to public monuments and academic endowments. For example, the University of Alberta’s Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies (CIUS), administers four endowments to honour leading Waffen-SS veterans who came to Canada.10 The CIUS also publishs the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, which claims “there has never...been a Ukrainian anti-Semitic organization or political party.”11

Historian Per Rudling says the Waffen SS Galicia “has been the object of intense myth making” and is “glorified” by Canada’s Ukrainian Right. “A sanitized, ideological narrative of the unit’s history has become an integral part of the Ukrainian diaspora’s culture of memory,” says Rudling, and “ritualized veneration of the unit became part of the ideological training of many diaspora youth organizations.”12 Their rendition of history relies on a “self-serving historical mythology”: “Even the Ukrainian Waffen-SS veterans’ investment in a fascist Europe was denied, and they remain respected and venerated as heroes and pillars of the community.”

Canadian governments, says Rudling, have “helped...develop and retain their myths, facilitated their history writing, [and] funded their activities down to the construction of nationalist monuments.”13

References

1. Per Anders Rudling, “‘The Honor They So Clearly Deserve’: Legitimizing the Waffen-SS Galizien,” The Journal of Slavic Military Studies 26:1, 2013. http://www.academia.edu/2763263

Richard, I've had a complaint against your thread. I think I need to remind you that the purpose of babble is discussion, it's not for publishing your work.

Sorry Meg, I know you have a tough job, but I beg to disagree. Yes, that's our policy, but Richard doesn't publish his work here (as some do rather than establishing their own platform). You may not have see the earlier thread where babblers weighed in on Richard's first article that he posted. My impression is that the prime driver on those who didn't want to see his articles here, were some who are politically opposed to the important exposure he is giving to the split in the Ukrainian community and the dangerous pro-fascist trend within that has been historically favoured by the Canadian ruling classes.

If this problem could be solved by Richard being asked to just provide a link to his article, with a few paras highlighted, then please let's do that. I value Richard's presence and contributions here, and his activism in the broader society.

But please note that he's trying to follow the policy as he understands it - by posting in "news by the rest of us". I think we should encourage such contributions, and that forum provides a perfect framework - all too little used.

ETA: Sorry Meg, I cut myself off (LOL). Here was the thread where much discussion was generated when Richard posted a full article:

Yes, I think that the problem was Richard posting a very long article directly in the forum rather than as a link with an abstract or summary. I certainly think his material is interesting, and will try to take the time to read it all. I think he may be underestimating the importance of left groups and movements other than the Communist Party, such as anarcho-communists and anarcho-syndicalists, as well as Ukrainian-Jewish Bundists, but I'll have to read his text closer; I only had time to skim it.

You may not have see the earlier thread where babblers weighed in on Richard's first article that he posted. My impression is that the prime driver on those who didn't want to see his articles here, were some who are politically opposed to the important exposure he is giving to the split in the Ukrainian community and the dangerous pro-fascist trend within that has been historically favoured by the Canadian ruling classes.

Clearly this is vital information because no one has posted anything about the Galicia Division in the past week, but Unionist, I raised questions about his article for the reasons I stated in that thread. Because I saw omissions and inaccuracies, and because I don't think it is an accurate reflection either of the community as a whole, or events of that time.

The other posters? I think they stated exactly why they had a problem with it too. But even if your assumptions were right, does that invalidate those concerns, or mean we should not raise them?

Thanks for the reminder about the dangerous pro-fascist trend over here in deeply divided Ukrainian central. I almost forgot about the torchlight rally we're having here in Saskatoon tonight. I know the most important thing to all my friends is staying united in keeping those commies in their place, and supporting the Empire.

Actually, despite the ongoing frustration of this campaign of lies that has been going on for the past few years (well, most recently. I think I mentioned it happened in the 80s as well when people started talking about the genocide) I am more amused than anything, k.

The largest population of Ukrainan Canadians is right here where I live; I have lived in parts of the prairies where they are in the majority. So I am kind of curious what planet the fascists are hiding on. Because I haven't seen much evidence of them here.

Thing is, we have had real fascist movements in Canada, in Anglo, Francophone, German and Italian communities. Guess who they and their friends the Klan wanted to keep out of the country.

Your mockery and defensiveness is sadly misplaced, Smith. I wasn't even thinking about you. I merely wanted to explain to Meg that some anonymous person flagging Richard's post doesn't make it offensive or contrary to babble policy.

As for your defensive comments, the centre of Ukrainian neo-fascist collaboration is in Ottawa - at the HQ of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress. I grew up with Ukrainian Canadians that were fiercely progressive, pro-labour, and anti-Nazi. Not the type that run that organization, rest assured.

I vividly remember them springing to the defence of this Ukrainian Nazi collaborator and murderer - the type which Canada admitted freely after the war, because of their "anti-communist" credentials, at the same time as they were declaring "one is too many" for Jewish and other genocide refugees. This particular bastard was saved from justice by God and old age and his Ukrainian fascist buddies:

Oh. You mean you were talking about lagatta and Timebandit? And you think they spoke up about the article just because they are biased and wanted to shut him down?

No. Lagatta was mistaken, and she corrected her error, when Richard pointed out that his post did indeed contain a link to the full PDF version which she could click and print or save if she wished. She intended no ill in that. Timebandit can speak for herself, but she does take an active role in the "I love Russia" vs. "I hate Russia" polemic here, as does lagatta. I personally hate Putin and his imperialist ambitions. But I don't share the lust for NATO and Canadian "defence" of the neo-Nazi Ukrainian state against the wishes of its own people in the east.

Quote:

So to be clear you aren't talking about a "split in the Ukrainian community and a dangerous pro-fascist trend". You are talking about some people in an office in Ottawa.

No, that's your straw-man bullshit. The UCC is the leading organ of the pro-U.S. pro-fascist wing of the Ukrainian Canadian community. You know - the organization that Cheri DiNovo and Peggy Nash and Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau and various fanatics on babble slavishly adore and support.

But carry on building your straw men. The Ukrainians I'm talking about were the ones that jumped up and down like little doggies when Hitler invaded and said, "pick me, pick me to help you wipe out the Bolsheviks and the Jews!!!!!". And they murdered my family, among hundreds of thousands of others. You will perhaps understand why I don't feel warm human sympathy to them. I wish them nothing but a dark and dismal fate.

Well actually it is your words, and we weren't talking about those Ukrainians in the first place. And I'll remind you that you are the one responding to our conversation.

I was talking about misrepresentation of events that happened 25 years before 1942, and insinuations of the Ukrainian Canadian community as a whole which simply do not hold water.

You did mention the "pro-fascist wing". I bet they'd know where that rally is tonight. Again though, I have no idea where these mystery fascists are hiding. One presumes they are somewhere out here between Edmonton and Beausejour, right?

Western Canada was the heartland of progressive Ukrainian-Canadian political activism. But gee Smith, when one thing fails, you try another, don't you? I'll give you credit for persistence. But I will return to my usual practice of ignoring those of your posts which make no sense. Sayonara.

ETA: Actually, wait, one more comment. The proper polite protocol would be: "Hey Unionist, fellow babbler, I'm sorry for the loss of your entire family at the hands of the Nazis and their Ukrainian collaborators - but I just have a difference with you about the aftermath of those politics in Canada today."

Of course, that would be your choice. And I think you've made your choice.

I most certainly don't hate Russia or Russians and had a lot of fun with left-wing, anticapitalist (but also anti-authoritarian and anti-homophobic) Russians who attended the European Social Forum in Paris. Warmhearted friendly people - who know a lot about the NHL ... I had to fake it a bit...

I actually did know about the left-right split among Ukrainians (and people of Ukrainian descent) here from meeting old lefty and labour activist Ukrainians. I am not responsible for the comments of any poster on the site; we are all adults.

Official support to the right wing of "ethnic" communities is not restricted to Ukrainians. The same applied to Italians, Greeks and of course Jews, certainly others.

I did express that sentiment, quite sincerely, the first time you brought it up probably three years ago.

If you don't remember I will go back and get it for you. And I have done so on some of the many occasions we have discussed this since then.

You may not realize, but it is out of consideration of your history that I stayed silent about it being brought into this conversation.

And lagatta, yes, of course I know that there are people on the political right within all communities. The way this tale has been spun in recent years if you aren't a left activist you are right wing servant of the Empire, and that among the Canadian Ukrainian community, nationalism is the same as fascism. And there was no equivalent of the real Canadian fascist parties, the Orange Lodge, or the KKK.

Thanks for informing me that there has been an anonymous complaint against my efforts.

If the purpose of this particular forum has changed (i.e., "You post your original article; we comment!") then that needs to be posted.

Thanks for your friendly reminder "that the purpose of babble is discussion."

As you can see, my articles here have indeed generated discussion.

I am happy to have helped fulfil this function of rabble.

There is also a repeated complaint expressed concerning my recent articles about ultra-right Ukrainian nationalists and how they arose in Canada. The complaint against my articles from 6079_Smith_W seems to insinuate that I am fabricating evidence about these neofascists and the very real century-old "right/left" split in the Ukrainian community. He suggests that these ultraright Ukrainians don't really exist on the ground or if they do exist, they are just squirreled away in some solitary Ottawa office.

"Again though, I have no idea where these mystery fascists are hiding" says 6079_Smith_W.

In another post above, after it has been pointed out to him that I named the Ukrainian Canadian Committee, he adds "So to be clear you aren't talking about a 'split in the Ukrainian community and a dangerous pro-fascist trend.' You are talking about some people in an office in Ottawa."

(This liitle office is run by people who have friendly meetings with Prime Ministers, Liberal and Conservative, and with prominent NDPers, who are all courting their votes and support. The creation of this organisation -- as i document -- was actually facilitated by the Liberal government in 1940. The Libs and the UCC were behind bringing thousands of Nazi SS Ukrainian vets to canada after WWII. I'm not privy to where they all are now, sorry, but I know that the fascist veterans organisations established by these Ukrainians are members of the UCC, which still revers them as heroes, builds statutes to them, names university programs after them, and celebrates them in the presence of prominent Cdn politicians. The UCC works closely with numerous MPs, Ukrainian and nonUkrainian alike, and is involved very deeply in contemporary political campaigns such as sending military supplies to the Ukraine and promoting the controversial National Memorial to Victims of Communism in Ottawa. See their website: http://www.ucc.ca/)

I have taken great pains to document my sources and have provided many weblinks which provide in great detail the names of key individuals and organisations across Canada who represent the movers and shakers among Canada's far-right Ukrainian community. If anyone wants to see who and where they are, I have provided that evidence.

Considering all of the facts that I have taken the trouble to provide about exactly who and where these people and organisations are in Canada, it requires a special skill to not be able to see them. In legal terms, this is called "blind eye knowledge," or in British courts it is refered to as "Nelsonian knowledge." In common parlance, we call this "turning a blind eye" and refer to the notion that "ignorance is bliss."

I have discussed this ability to ignore the facts even when they are staring you in the face (and Canada's peculiar brand of this phenomenon) in my introductory article ("The Canada Syndrome, a Captivating Mass Psychosis") which appeared in Captive Canada. (This has also recently generated a line of discussion elsewhere on rabble.)

Ironically, the psychology of this was well described by George Orwell who in his novel 1984, developed the concept of “doublethink,” which he described as: “The power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.... To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient."

This psychological process was also described as “a form of trained, willful intellectual blindness to contradictions in a belief system. Doublethink differs from ordinary hypocrisy in that the ‘doublethinking’ person deliberately had to forget the contradiction between his two opposing beliefs — and then deliberately forget that he had forgotten the contradiction.... Orwell describes it as ‘controlled insanity.’”

The reason this is ironic, is that the moniker 6079_Smith_W refers to Winston Smith, the heroic protagonist of Orwell's 1949 novel 1984. He stands for honesty, truth, resistance to totalitarianism and obviously opposes the propaganda of "Big Brother." In the movie, whenever Winston appears on a telescreen, he is labelled "6079 Smith W."

Hope this too generates some additional friendly discussion and debate here on whether my articles about neofascists in Canada, and other issues, should be barred from posting on rabble.

So are you saying that everyone here who has a handle is afraid to use their real name? (and I am not sure why that would be, or what relevance it has to this conversation) In any case, you aren't just tarring me, but most of the people here.

If we want to get specific that is one of the things about your articles I have a problem with. Making false associations and innuendo (like the fact a soldier fought in a war being an example of right wing elements in a community) or leaving out information to make someone look bad (like regularly mentioning J.S. Woodsworth's letter regarding Jake Penner with no context of the history between the two men).

One other reason I picked the name, Richard, is the fact that the media in Orwell's dystopia could change their version of reality on a dime, and make what was true one day a lie the next, as it suited their political ends.

Pretty much what happened with the official story about Ukraine, and the Ukrainian community here when it went from being part of the family to the time when people started pointing out atrocities, and wanting self-determination.

If I remember correctly I said I appreciate your research insofar as it reflects things which in fact happened. Fact is, the way you tie it all together is not entirely accurate. Not regarding the internment, not in equating Ukrainian integration in Canadian society with right wing support of empire, and not in equating grievances and self-determination with pro fascism.

Like I said, we have had real fascist movements here in Canada, in communities that weren't branded enemy aliens, forced to register, and could be sent to a camp at any time for no reason at all. So if you wonder why I am on this one it is because of the unfairness of using that terrible act by the Canadian government to smear those who were under attack, and in some cases just trying to get by.

No one is preventing mention of the Galicia Battalion and its atrocities here. It gets talked about all the time, at least since the uprising in Ukraine. And really, no one is preventing talk about right wing elements in the Ukrainian community. For myself, I just think it is worth pointing out when I see an ulterior motive, omissions and inaccuracies, and when I see evidence used in a way that doesn't reflect what really happened, or which magnifies it out of context.

If anything, it is because your articles are full of facts, many of which are true, that I think it is important to remind people to look for what you leave out, and when you make associations that are not supported.

No, as you well know, I never said all people who use "handles" were "afraid." That is just another of many examples of you using a "straw man" argument. But at least this time you asked if that was what I was saying. So again, no, you know it wasn't.

I was pointing out the irony of your Orwellian moniker, considering the fact that you said you couldn't see any Ukrainian fascists in our midst even when I had pointed right at them with names and links in my articles. You have continued to turn away from the facts about these neofascists in your most recent response which makes no mention of this issue of your wilful blindness and doublethink. You are doing what you say I do, which is to leave out facts. This reveals your continuing unwillingness to face the reality of what I was saying in my articles.

Of course we all include and leave out facts when we make an argument. How could we do otherwise? Even 20 billion pages could not include all of the facts. Imagine the complaints I'd get if my articles were even longer, with even more references?

It would take too long for me to document for your benefit, again and again, the arguments that I have already made in my arguments. You bring up JSWoodsworth (who you refuse to believe was a xenophobic racist even though his words -- which i quote extensively support that), his refusal to assist Penner or other communists who were unjustly interned, and the Ukrainian WWI veteran (who is still revered as a great hero by the Cdn govt and the Ukrainian right because he received a medal from the King for his contribution to the British empire, which I still believe makes it reasonable for me to refer to as an example of support for imperialism). I stand by what I wrote about all of these other issues until you are able to present some facts that convince me otherwise.

I don't want to waste any more time explaining what I have already written.

You said no one was trying to prevent me from posting my material here.

I'm sorry if I misinterpreted the moderator's short-and-sweet comment. She said:

"Richard, I've had a complaint against your thread. I think I need to remind you that the purpose of babble is discussion, it's not for publishing your work."

That seems to me to suggest that whoever complained must have said they didn't think i should post my articles and that this complaint has led the moderator to caution me not to post further articles here.

I am presuming here that MegB is a moderator or has some authority within rabble to caution me not to post my work to this forum. She (if she is a she) did not identify herself as a moderator, or explain who she was. I guess i am supposed to know that. Sorry i don't know you MegB. But, of course, my ignorance is no excuse.

Could someone please explain whether I am in fact allowed continue to do what the stated purpose of this forum says that I am allowed to do?

i.e., "You post your original article; we comment!"

I am getting conflicting messages.

Also, perhaps someone could step forward and explain the exact nature of the complaint against my posting original articles here, isn't that what we are supposed to do?

Without being given the ability to read the exact complaints lodged against me, I am feeling a bit like Winston Smith, although i remain

Meg B is our moderator (we have a seasonal mod called Old Goat). Moderation seems to be complaint-driven nowadays. Perhaps this reflects the lack of hours the moderator is given to do her job. Don't be surprised if you do not get a summary of the complaint against you. That might take time from the mod that, well, she doesn't have. [Edited to add: Meg also, sometimes, participates in discussion which can be unnerving because it's not clear that she's not wearing her moderator "hat". But this is a side point.]

This board has a long history, going back to 2001. I have been a member since May of that year. We have far fewer participants, or moderators now than we once had. I mention the former because, IMHO, we had plenty of "lurkers" who helped us self-moderate and who made discussion here much more interesting. [edited to add: there are also some revered babblers who have left or passed away. I mention skdadl, Boom Boom, etc. ]

Anyway, carry on. If you want to start a discussion, feel free to do so. I find that if I spend the little time to quote extensively from an article, even most of it, that, as long as I do not quote the article in its entirety, then I'm pretty well OK to be free from the kind of complaint that you got. [Edited to add: so leave the footnotes out, and a paragraph or two, and you should be fine.]

I get lots and lots of complaints for other stuff. I quote Margaret Atwood on that: Nolite te bastardes carborundorum!

i prefer to include plenty of references in my articles -- with weblinks if possible -- so readers can verify the quotes if they want and learn more details than what i have space to include in the article. I think posting the article here in its entirety makes more sense and fits with the purpose of this forum which is: "post your original article," not "post your original article [but don't include your references]."

You said:

"as I do not quote the article in its entirety, then I'm pretty well OK to be free from the kind of complaint that you got. [Edited to add: so leave the footnotes out, and a paragraph or two, and you should be fine."

But in this case, I'm posting my own articles so this does not contravene issues of copyright, especially when I want people to spread them around. The purpose of writing these articles is for people to read them, learn something, provoke discussion...

Frankly i don't understand how the complaint could be legitimate, or taken seriously, but then again, i don't know what the complaint said, and i never will...

Long posts are bad for other reasons; it's harder to jump to the next post if you've already read the first post, thread length gets awkward, and so on. You are going to find out that you cannot edit a first post so I would suggest, as well, leaving first posts brief.

"Amid the continued support given to the fascist politicians and military of Ukraine by western governments, many people are asking how such a betrayal of the sacrifices of the Allies in WWII could take place. However, what most people are unaware of, in large part due to an ever-more corrupted media, is that these governments have a shocking history of protecting the perpetrators of some of the most terrible crimes of that war.

One of the most egregious examples of this practice of shielding war-criminals from justice was confirmed in 2005 with the declassification of British Home Office papers showing that the British government protected at least 8,000 members of the Waffen-SS Galitsia Division...An interesting component to these documents and particularly to the solicitations of the Canadian MP Panchuk, was the appeal to sympathy for the men of the Galitsia Division due to their fighting against Russians and communists...."

---

"On Remembrance Day 2010, Paul Grod, President of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, in the name of 1.2 million Ukrainian-Canadians paid tribute to the veterans of the Waffen-SS Galizien, and remembered its fallen 'who perished fighting for the freedom of their ancestral homeland."

You will see 5 snapshots of that page from 2016. Interestingly, the UCC stopped listing these fascist groups as members sometime between May 8, 2016 and Oct 7, 2016. My research was published in April.

If you look at the first snapshot from 2010, the groups are listed there. So for at least 6 years they had been listing these groups as their members and then they just disappear from the list. May be just a coincidence. Did the last of the vets die off? Anyone want to check if these associations still exist? Give Paul a call, see if he'll talk...

The relevant section of Paul Grod's quote on that day is this:"As Ukrainian Canadians we also remember and pay tribute to the millions of men and women who perished fighting for the freedom of their ancestral Ukrainian homeland. The men and women of the Ukrainian Sich Riflemen, the 1st Ukrainian Division of the Ukrainian National Army, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army and the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists."

The reason that he does not seem to "pay tribute" to the Waffen SS on that day is that about one week before the war ended, the Ukrainian Waffen SS Galicia cleverly changed their name to the "1st Ukrainian Division of the Ukrainian National Army". Sounds better. The Nazis were getting a bad name, a new era was coming, better change their spots...

The thousands of Waffen SS vets who were brought to Canada, largely from UK where they were held prisoner (after being captured in Italy), and the UPA/OUN vets (who also fought against our team in the war), formed associations that joined and took leadership roles in the UCC, of which Paul Grod is now the president.

The Legion of Ukrainian Sich Riflemen was formed in WWI and was fighting for the AustoHungarian empire, against the British empire (Their imperialists vs. our imperialists). The Sich leaders created and led the UPA which became the Sich's Riflemen's successor organisation.

Thanks, Richard. I was going to post that the Nazis are still part of the UCC, and hailed as patriots by the UCC, but I defer to your chapter and verse proof of that proposition.

Our politicians - from Justin Trudeau to Cheri DiNovo to Peggy Nash (and I won't bother with the rest of the list) - need to be held to account for their support for these collaborators with Nazism and falsifiers of history and of the present. Those politicians who can honestly plead ignorance, deserve to be informed.

I just want to point out that Western complicity with Allies of the Reich is by no means restricted to those from Ukraine. Of course I'm far more knowledgeable about Italian history (including Italian migration to the Canadian state) and while there was a draconian screening of suspected Communists and other leftists, very few questions were asked about former Fascists. Of course the Fascists were in power until 1943, when the Nazis took over what remained of Fascist Italy with the complicity of the Republic of Salò "Ultas" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Social_Republic, and men of fighting age were conscripted, but it is a matter of not going into their participation in war crimes.

Many Nazis and their allies also found refuge in South American countries.

This is not "whataboutery": my point is that this is not at all uniquely Canadian. Even in occupied countries such as France, many collaborators were able to continue in politics and other careers unhindered.

Clearly, anti-communism (even of the pathological fascist kind) is a kind of "get-out-of-jail-free-card" for these fascists mentioned. And the "blessings" of anti-communism thereby continue to this day. They would continue were communists to disappear from the earth.

I just want to point out that Western complicity with Allies of the Reich is by no means restricted to those from Ukraine. Of course I'm far more knowledgeable about Italian history (including Italian migration to the Canadian state) and while there was a draconian screening of suspected Communists and other leftists, very few questions were asked about former Fascists. Of course the Fascists were in power until 1943, when the Nazis took over what remained of Fascist Italy with the complicity of the Republic of Salò "Ultas" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Social_Republic, and men of fighting age were conscripted, but it is a matter of not going into their participation in war crimes.

Many Nazis and their allies also found refuge in South American countries.

This is not "whataboutery": my point is that this is not at all uniquely Canadian. Even in occupied countries such as France, many collaborators were able to continue in politics and other careers unhindered.

Yes, I believe that this is important to put this in context. Unfortunately, the Nazis found a great deal of support in virtually every country they invaded. Some of the best units in their army were made of volunteers from occupied countries. The right's slogan in France was " Better Hitler than Blum ( leader of the socialist party in France). We have been fed a diet in movies and TV of valiant resistant fighters struggling against Nazi tyranny while the truth is those who actively opposed the Nazis were a minority and a small one at that usually.

Or it could be that he was talking about exactly what he said - the division reformed in 1945 under allegiance to Ukraine. Or certainly to make a distinction between collaboration with the Nazis, and those who took part in atrocities, and those who did not, and whose goal was to defend Ukraine from the Soviets.

And you know, it isn't so much a matter of denying collaboration with the Nazis and commission of atrocities by those who did, but more leaving out the context of a struggle where all the major parties collaborated with the Nazis at some point, and some in all camps committed atrocities.The division would never have been formed in the first place had it not been for a far greater collaboration and subsequent betrayal.

Kind of like dismissing the Sich as "imperialists". And leaving out that the Ukrainian Insurgent Army fought the Nazis as well as the Soviets.

This is not "whataboutery": my point is that this is not at all uniquely Canadian. Even in occupied countries such as France, many collaborators were able to continue in politics and other careers unhindered.

Yup. The only difference in the east is that it was their dogma to equate the fascists with the capitalists, and claim the Nazis were all "over there". So it was pretty important (and remains important) to deny any collaboration with the Nazis to keep up their reputation as the power that saved the world from Nazism.

After all, it is kind of hard to justify an anti-fascist protection wall when you are hiring former fascists.

Yes, I actually have one remaining friend who was a Resistance fighter as a very young man in Normandy - he is 95 now. Pretty much all the people I knew who were in the Resistance (in different countries, but especially France and Italy - I studied Italian history) and those who survived Nazi/Fascist persecution have died now, fortunately for biological reasons, not political and/or racial persecution. He feared collaborators far more than German Army "regulars" (the SS and Gestapo were another matter).

The ruthless and genocidal Nazis often had a seemingly odd regard for "rank". Léon Blum actually survived his wartime internment at Buchenwald and Dachau in relative "comfort", despite being a Jewish Socialist who was a popular target among the French far right. He was among prominent prisoners held as "hostages", and was saved by the arrival of Allied forces in May 1945.

Smith, the division didn't "reform in 1945," it changed it's bloody SS name just a week or so before the war's foreseeable end in order to cover its bloody tracks. Who falls for such shallow deception? These Ukrainianian Nazis were armed, financed, organised and following direct orders from German high command. You think they suddenly became saints at the very end of the war after all their carnage?

Why are you trying to make it sound like the jury is still out on these guys? They weren't all that bad, everyone was responsible for a little collaboration and atrocity here and there. You want us to cut them some slack. They were fighting Soviets afterall and so that is okay?

In terms of "leaving out" their victims, you say:

"leaving out that the Ukrainian Insurgent Army fought the Nazis as well as the Soviets."

You forgot to mention that they helped the Nazis wipe out 90% of Ukraine's Jewish population! And, what about the Poles? You also forgot that these Nazis massacred hundreds a hundred thousand civilians of Polish heritage living in the Ukraine?

Leaving stuff out is a large part of what I was talking about in my article. Like where I said:

The cult’s myths obfuscate and deny the OUN-B’s role in terrorism, mass murder, ethnic cleansing and Nazi collaboration during the Holocaust,5 in which 90% of Ukraine’s Jews were killed.6 Also sublimated is the OUN-B’s recourse to Judeo-Red conspiracy narratives. ... University of Alberta professor Karyn Ball and Swedish historian Per Rudling detail how the UCC and others have “dismissed or minimised an increasingly well-documented history of Ukrainian nationalist participation in pogroms and collaboration with the Nazis in mass murder in order to consolidate a heroic-victim identity for Canadian-Ukrainians....”8

One group of people we should not forget that these Ukrainian Nazis wiped out were Unionists family, as he told us all on December 11, 2016, above. So let's not leave them out of our narrative either.

If the police blackmail a hells angel biker to rat on his friends, that's NOT THE SAME AS if the police chief and his staff are all hells angels themselves!

Yet Smith you equate these two scenarios.

You do not mention the huge difference between the fascists that worked for the Stasi (in the source you included) and the fascists that worked, say, for the US.

In the case of East Germany (which you provided) it says, for example:

=====

Sommer was instrumental in the bombing of seven synagogues in Paris in October 1941. But after World War II, he spent years spying on right-wing politicians for the new regime in East Germany, and was later posted to Italy where he continued to do the same. (emphasis added)...

Nazis blackmailed into working for communists

But the book claims that... they were blackmailed into working for the ubiquitous Stasi....

Läritz was considered vital because he had compromising information about other Nazi operatives who were then blackmailed into joining the Stasi as well, Leide said."

=======

So here is what you leave out in your effort to eqaute the East German recruitment of Nazis to the US/NATO recruitment of Nazis:

The Nazis voluntarily joined the US/NATO forces in the new fascist war against communism that started even before WWII ended.

For example, Nazi General Reinhard Gehlen deliberately turned himself in to the Americans when the war was seen to be almost over and kindly offered his knowledge, skills, services, files, contacts, and former personnel to help the new war against the Soviets. Why? because as a head Nazi general in charge of all the national fascist armies in Eastern Europe, he shared the US/NATO anticommunist purpose.

Gehlan was welcomed in by US/NATO. He was not blackmailed into joining. The opposite. He was generously rewarded, reunited with his old Nazi buddies, they got all their files on the fascist armies that had been helping the Nazis fight the communists in Eastern European countries (like Ukraine) and he started the Gehlen Org and he was made Chief of the West German secret police.

The US also brought over the Nazi rocket scientists who led the US space program (like Wernher von Braun), as well a Nazi scientists who ran truly wicked experiments on Jews and communists in concentration camps.

The key thing here is that they were not BLACKMAILED (ie., forced against their wishes) into joining the Americans and NATO. They wanted to join! That is a MAJOR difference with the Nazis recruited by the East Germans, at least as described in your source.

And yet you make it sound like the exact same process of recruiting Nazis was going on East and West. You equate the two.

P.S. I am sorry I have equated the hells angels with the US/NATO. This is totally unfair to the hells angels, who are sweet boy scouts compared to the criminal thugs in the US/NATO "confidence scheme."

The division was mostly wiped out in 1944, so in fact it was reformed.

Putting a military force under the command of a different nation actually is a significant change. And the accusations of atrocities never were levelled at the division as a whole, but against battalions within it.

I am not saying the jury is out (that is to say, I take the accusations seriously), but extrapolating it to "these guys" is a gross overstatement. To imply that they all took part in atrocities is false.

Did you read my last comment?

Quote:

it isn't so much a matter of denying collaboration with the Nazis and commission of atrocities by those who did, but more leaving out the context of a struggle where all the major parties collaborated with the Nazis at some point, and some in all camps committed atrocities.

As for them fighting Soviets, yes, I think fighting the country that committed genocide against Ukraine by famine and forced relocation is a valid reason for wanting to take up arms. That's why I think the distinction is a significant one.

It is also worth remembering that Stalin's complicity wasn't just at the battalion level. His country signed a treaty to enforce Nazi anti-Jewish laws in the areas of Poland they invaded. Committing their own mass slaughter of Poles, then later blaming it on the Nazis? I expect he did that for his own purposes.

In the context of the discussion about its name change in 1945, you brought up the "reform in 1945." Now you switch to 1944.

The "reform" in 1944 did not change its spots. It was still an arm of the Nazis war machine.

You say: "Putting a military force under the command of a different nation actually is a significant change"

Do you think the Waffen SS was put under th command of another nation in 1944? It wasn't. Where'd you get that from?

MAYBE, just maybe, it came "under th command of another nation" when in the very last days before the war's end they changed their bloody name. But even that is a big stretch. Unless you think the Waffen SS Galicia was a nation unto itself. Who was commanding it in those last few days? What "other nation"?

Good to hear at least that you "take the accusations seriously". However, with all the evidence and facts now at our disposal, I think we are safe to be sure now that "accusations" of mass murder and participation in genocide are absolutely true. But since these are still just "accusations" I guess we need to keep an open mind, like you, and give them the benefit of the doubt. After all there must have been some innocent guys amongst them and that counts for something.

How is that any difference? This isn't about former Nazis and their motivation. It is about the state using them and protecting them from prosecution, as the DDR did in this case.That justifies not putting them on trial?

And yes, the rocket scientist were also taken under duress.No surprise there.

Good to hear at least that you "take the accusations seriously". However, with all the evidence and facts now at our disposal, I think we are safe to be sure now that "accusations" of mass murder and participation in genocide are absolutely true. But since these are still just "accusations" I guess we need to keep an open mind, like you, and give them the benefit of the doubt. After all there must have been some innocent guys amongst them and that counts for something.

Please spare me the backhanded compliments. I call them accusations because that is what they are. I do not doubt that they were committed.. But the question is who among these 13,000 soldiers committed them, and who did not. The accusations were not levelled at the division as a whole, so it is not a case of "innocent guys amongst them", but rather whole units that never had anything to do with it.

Thanks for the article about the very few German scientists who went to work for the Soviets. It is interesting to compare the big differences between the ways German scientists were used and treated by the US and the USSR.

You didn't mention Gehlen. Did the Soviets also put Nazis into powerful positions after WWII (like the US did) and employ them to to run huge programs to wage the continuing war against communism?

As for the thousands of Ukrainians brought to Cda after the war in which they fought against us and our allies under the Nazi banner, the Canadian government did not take much care to go through that immigrant list and eliminate those involved in the atrocities. They did not purge what you might call the "bad apples" from the thousands of soldiers fighting for the Nazis that they were so excited to welcome to Canada (against the very strong opposition of the Cdn Jewish Congress and the left-wing Ukrainian organisations).

You talk about "whole units that never had anything to do with it" but these were "whole units" of soldiers who were armed, trained, equipped and following direct orders from Nazi command. And, they were volunteers who wore SS uniforms. So despite you saying that somehow they "never had anything to do with it," they did indeed have something "to do with it."

While you say Canada is "a nation which prides itself on its anti-Nazi reputation" this is -- of course -- dubious since we should all know that Prime Minister King and his Liberal government

turned away Jews fleeing the Nazis,

met with Hitler and other leading Nazis and Mussolini (and wrote in his diary about how wonderful he thought they all were), and then

put thousands of Jewish refugees in internment camps in Quebec and New Brunswick during the war (when Britain sent them here as prisoners of war), and then, surprise surprise, they

brought thousands of Nazi collaborators over to Canada after the war where they took leadership positions in organisations like the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, which still celebrates them as great heroes, and then

started the Cold War Profunc program which surveilled tens of thousands of leftists and made annual lists of radicals to be rounded up for internment camps, until the 1980s

Debunking Canada's bogus "reputation" is something we should all try to encourage. That's what I am trying to do. Can we agree on whether this is a good thing to do?

I brought up the fact that thousands of Ukrainian Waffen SS soldiers who came to Canada ALL wore uniforms and were ALL trained, armed, financed and led by the Nazis because you said some of them "had nothing to do with it".

It is also worth remembering that Stalin's complicity wasn't just at the battalion level. His country signed a treaty to enforce Nazi anti-Jewish laws in the areas of Poland they invaded.

That's some of the worst lying shit I've ever heard on this board. My family lived for 21 months under Soviet occupation. It wasn't pleasant, but there was no persecution of Jews. When the Soviets retreated after Barbarossa began - that's when they were all murdered. With the assistance of the Ukrainian fascist militias that you are trying to whitewash here.

This discussion is making me sick. Reversing the verdict on the Nazis and their filthy murdering helpers. What the fuck??

It is also worth remembering that Stalin's complicity wasn't just at the battalion level. His country signed a treaty to enforce Nazi anti-Jewish laws in the areas of Poland they invaded.

That's some of the worst lying shit I've ever heard on this board. My family lived for 21 months under Soviet occupation. It wasn't pleasant, but there was no persecution of Jews. When the Soviets retreated after Barbarossa began - that's when they were all murdered. With the assistance of the Ukrainian fascist militias that you are trying to whitewash here.

This discussion is making me sick. Reversing the verdict on the Nazis and their filthy murdering helpers. What the fuck??

I won't go as far as Unionist here but I must admit I have never heard of this provision in the USSR Germany treaty. I also tried to find some evidence of it and could not find it. Do you have a source to verify this?

I won't go as far as Unionist here but I must admit I have never heard of this provision in the USSR Germany treaty. I also tried to find some evidence of it and could not find it. Do you have a source to verify this?

I have a source. I'm alive. My parents survived. Please do not feed this neo-Nazi bullshit. I don't give a fuck who signed what with whom. Equating the wartime Soviet Union with Hitler's Germany is a crime against humanity in my book. I'll give you an autographed copy of my book any old time.

I wasn't talking about Canada, Richard. I was talking about Russia's need to protect its anti-Nazi reputation.

Secondly, it wouldn't have been the Molotov Ribbentropp pact if Stalin had not replaced his foreign minister Maxim Litvinov because he was Jewish, and ordered Molotov to "purge the ministry of Jews". Hitler took that as a sign of sincerity on Stalin's part.

As part of the negotiations Stalin pledged to remove Jews from positions of influence, and that is what they did. I stand corrected on it being written in the treaty, but it was critical to it happening.

Am I equating Stalin with Hitler? Not in the specific instance of antisemitism. But he was no friend to Jewish people, and had no problem throwing them over to do a deal with Hitler. And in terms of his butchery, he was just as bad.

I won't go as far as Unionist here but I must admit I have never heard of this provision in the USSR Germany treaty. I also tried to find some evidence of it and could not find it. Do you have a source to verify this?

I have a source. I'm alive. My parents survived. Please do not feed this neo-Nazi bullshit. I don't give a fuck who signed what with whom. Equating the wartime Soviet Union with Hitler's Germany is a crime against humanity in my book. I'll give you an autographed copy of my book any old time.

I didn't mean any disrepect to your parents. As far as I am concerned being in the SS is enough to be discredited. Although the Wehrmacht also was committed numerous crimes during the occupation. What book?

Sorry jjuares, I was being sardonic about "in my book". I didn't write a book. My mother did, though. I'll find a way to send you that, if you're interested. And the Wehrmacht was not nearly as guilty as the SS and their "native" collaborators. They were just soldiers, for the most part, like our own troops who go and invade and occupy other countries. The soldiers aren't the criminals. They're the fodder.

Sorry jjuares, I was being sardonic about "in my book". I didn't write a book. My mother did, though. I'll find a way to send you that, if you're interested. And the Wehrmacht was not nearly as guilty as the SS and their "native" collaborators. They were just soldiers, for the most part, like our own troops who go and invade and occupy other countries. The soldiers aren't the criminals. They're the fodder.

I would be interested in the book. Have you read Christopher Browning's book? It is called Ordinary Men. He looks at a police battalion not SS and recounts the terrible things they did. Now of course the SS took great joy in killing while the Ordnary Men simply followed orders but did the killing nonetheless.

The purpose of the meetings was to enable the German and Soviet security forces including Gestapo and NKVD respectively, to share information regarding their parallel terror operations in occupied Poland. In spite of their differences on other issues, both Heinrich Himmler and Lavrentiy Beria had common goals as far as the fate of Poland was concerned.

In fact, Stalin was deporting communists, many of them Jewish, to Nazi Germany years before the pact, during the terror.

To tie this back, it isn't my motive here to whitewash anything. but if we are going to have an accusation about an entire battalion thrown on the table, and the actions of the Soviet government of the time conveniently left off the table, and have them hailed as the nation that saved the world from Nazis, I think it is only fair to point out some of their actions.

Stalin did not simply sign that agreement as a defensive measure; he persecuted and deported hundreds of thousands of Jews during the Polish occupation for his own reasons, purged Jews from his government bureaucracy to please the Nazis, and worked with the Gestapo and German military. His reign of terror in Poland was just as bad as that of the Nazis.

The terror, and the famine and genocide of the early 30s is why many Ukrainians joined up to fight the Soviets. Yes, units of the Galicia Battalion which took part in atrocities should rightly be condemned. Not everyone did that. Entire units had nothing to do with it. And while it might seem an easy mental leap for us to link anyone who wore a German uniform to those atrocities, that is not how it works.

It is important to point this out given how Russia has hauled this lie out to demonize those in former occupied nations who want autonomy, and have been invaded. And doubly important while Russia is bankrolling and running propaganda for the real neo-fascist parties like Jobbik, like National Front, like Freedom Party, like Alternativ fuer Deutschland.

Do I think they are the evil empire? Of course not. But they are no better than the Americans, the Chinese, or any other gangsters. And there is nothing about their attacks on western political systems that is going to make anything any better.

Smith, you have put an impressive amount of energy into arguing that not all of the Nazi Waffen SS veterans who the Canadian government welcomed here can be proven to be guilty of war crimes because not every grouping within their ranks can be shown definitively to have been guilty of war crimes. While some of these Ukrainian troops fighting for the Nazis are well known to have massacred hundreds of thousands of innocent Jewish and Polish civilians (as well as many communist fighters who were trying to protect them), there are those Nazi Ukrainian troops who we can't be sure, as you say, "had anything to do with it."

Do you think then that the Canadian Jewish Congress and the Ukrainian socialists were in the wrong when, after the war, they tried their very best to stop the Canadian government from bringing in all of the many thousands of Ukrainian Nazi Waffen SS soldiers (then being held captive in prisoner of war camps in Britain) who had fought against Canadian soldiers and our allies against Hitler in WWII?

Since Canadian authorities were clearly not interested in trying to screen out the many war criminals from the Waffen SS Galicia and the ultraright Ukrainian nationalist OUN/UPA (known for espousing terrorism against civilians and political assassinations as part of their core strategy), what were Canadian Jewish organisations and left-leaning Ukrainians and other progressives supposed to do? Were they supposed to sit back and just do nothing while Cda's antiSemitic Liberal govt brought thousands of Nazi-linked troops into this country? Which side would you have been on in that struggle?

I wonder where JS Woodsworth and the CCF stood on that. Did they make common cause with the communists who were trying to stop Cda's wholesale immigration of Ukrainian troops who'd volunteered to wage war against us under the Nazi banner?